Gently with the Ladies (Inspector George Gently 13) Read Online Free PDF

stick till tomorrow lunchtime. That’ll give me an alibi with the family.’
    ‘As you like, Chief. It’s all one to me.’
    They took a cursory glance at the rest of the flat, including Fazakerly’s untidy bedroom; then, on the landing, Gently pointed to the second door.
    ‘What do they keep in that?’ he asked.
    ‘It’s just a boxroom.’
    Reynolds shoved open the door. Inside was a stack of expensive luggage. Colourful labels, now marked and rubbed, spoke of Paris, Cannes, Monaco, Capri.
    ‘Did you find the door locked when you came here?’
    Reynolds frowned, said: ‘I don’t remember.’
    ‘That’s fresh cigarette ash down there.’
    ‘That’d probably be Buttifant. He always has a fag on.’
    Gently nodded, remembering Buttifant, a sad-faced man who smoked self-rolled cigarettes.
    Just his trademark on the floor.
    What was the point of trying too hard?

 
     
    CHAPTER THREE
     
    I N THAT CASE , why was he still hesitating, while the two of them stood waiting for the lift to ascend? Not because of his celebrated intuition: that was backing Reynolds all the way! Nor was it for any family reason. Honour was satisfied there. Already he was choosing the words he would use to Geoffrey (‘I checked each stage of the case . . . frankly, it was hopeless.’) So what was it?
    He turned to Reynolds. ‘I think I’ll talk to the Bannister woman, since I’m round here.’
    Reynolds looked at him quickly. ‘You’re still not satisfied—?’
    ‘Oh yes. But I’m bloody curious too.’
    And that was the fact of the matter: he was bloody curious too. Not about Fazakerly, who he’d written off, but about that surprising woman, his victim. Clytie Fazakerly, invert, voluptuary, who had whored her way to a big fortune, who’d created this strange green mansion, and along with it the germ of her own destruction. A laudable motive? Perhaps not! But a strong motive, without doubt. And who could say that it might not lead him to . . . well . . . some truth, some new understanding. In his profession, at his rank, a degree of creative latitude was defensible . . .
    ‘If you don’t mind, Chief, I’ll get along. I’m expecting Buttifant from Rochester.’
    ‘Good. Let me know if you find any bloodstains.’
    ‘Of course, Chief. I’ll keep in touch.’
    The lift arrived, but on second thoughts Gently went down by the stairs: those same stairs which Fazakerly had run down, at the same hour, three days previously. They were prosaic enough. They proceeded in a single flight to the floor below, bare concrete treads with a steel handrail and lit by a clumsy, industrial-pattern wall lamp-unit. Glass panelled swing doors gave access to them from the end of each landing. From the foot of one flight you passed the doors to the top of the next flight down.
    Gently came to the sixth-floor landing. It was more impersonal than the one above. A varnished sign-board pointed to a hallway and was lettered: FLATS 21–25. The landing however was similarly carpeted and had its own quota of chairs, while in place of the boxroom on the other landing was an illuminated basin in which goldfish swam.
    He rang the bell of Flat 20. The door was answered by a maid. She wore a neat uniform and apron and make-up which carried pinkness above the cheekbones.
    ‘Please?’
    Her accent was un-English.
    ‘Chief Superintendent Gently. I’d like to speak to Mrs Bannister.’
    ‘Oh, yes, thank you. Please wait here.’
    Behind her she left a fulsome fragrance which suggested poppies or chrysanthemums. Gently heard her tap at an inner door and say something unintelligible in her lisping twitter. ‘Who?’ a powerful voice demanded. ‘Very well. Show him in, Albertine.’ Albertine re-appeared and made a slight curtsey.
    ‘Please, Monsieur is to enter.’
    He was shown into a room corresponding to the lounge in the flat above, but there was no nonsense about this room, though it was expensively furnished. On the floor lay an Indian carpet which may